Today was the day #UKRI required my University and hundreds of others to submit their decisions on what to cut, how hard and what to terminate.
And required this with a timescale of 3 weeks which included Easter, Ramadan, Passover, up to Orthodox Easter. And school holidays.
To all the research and finance staff, PIs, Co-Is, and University leaders who have worked flat out to find ways of responding with integrity to this unprecedented situation and who have just been colleagues - thank you. 🙏🏾🙏🏾🙏🏾 we still have far to go. But it’s made a difference.
For #GCRF hubs deadline looms next week. So more pain ahead. Forthright comments from @heavencrawley & @profrichdawson
on #UKRi letter some PIs have received to send to partners.
And for expressing what many feel - that we have a duty of care to future award holders and that to volunteer now feels so wrong @ResProfNews tinyurl.com/3mh8sap3
Civil Servants are in difficult positions and the many good people @UKRI_News have had a disgraceful and shameful task thrust upon them by U.K. Government. No doubt.
Consequences of these disproportionate & unfair cuts will reverberate for a long time. Trust is broken #GCRFCuts
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The good folk @GCRFWaterHub have lots of great examples of the vital work they are doing - give them a follow. It’s amazing how much you will learn. 👇🏼💚👏🏼
#UKRI announced award of 141 new projects under #GCRF all addressing #SDGs
Global challenges being tackled by projects include [d]:
👉🏼environmental disasters
👉🏼education for children living through conflict
👉🏼malnutrition.” #odacutsukri.org/news/ukri-anno…
Many of these 141 #GCRF award holders had been under strict @beisgovuk imposed embargo on #UKRI for over a year. I know, I was one of them. Delivering during the pandemic meant constant requests to ‘reprofile’ our grants meaning using resource to make projects Covid compliant
Between and in secret because of the embargo we worked out how to ensure partners had access to good enough internet for our partner meetings. This meant investing in and rapidly learning g about mobile technologies #odacuts#gcrfcuts#ukricuts
“The scrapping of ODA projects will lead to a “loss of trust” in the UK that “will take years to rebuild”, warned Prof Anne Johnson, the president of the Academy of Medical Sciences.
“I wrote, along with the other National Academies to the Foreign Secretary on the value of ODA-funded research, and again in March to the Chancellor on the need to protect the science budget.”
Comment piece in Telegraph from CEO @ICR_London “Slashing research funding is a blow to Global Britain. The Government will do long-term damage if it reduces support for the UK’s university research base.”
(Paywalled)
Greg Clark MP has written to PM saying cuts amount to “a devastating reduction which would reverse two years of intended increases and mean that the ambition for Britain to be a science superpower would be deferred for much of this parliament”.(paywalled) thetimes.co.uk/article/devast…
Everyday since news of #ukricuts#gcrfcuts broke another set of previously unimaginable consequences occur:- 1) end of peer review for grants - it was already on a shoogly peg but who is now going to donate labour to laborious review of proposals - including risk assessments? 😐
2) Applications for funding - it takes two years constant work to go from idea to successful application with success rates low. To do this needs trust that if successful your work will be funded throughout (stage-gated). Right now I can’t imagine why I would EVER apply again.
3/ Partnerships. It takes years to build towards equitable partnerships in contexts of conflict & impoverishment. Some of mine are over 14 years in making. Steady, constant care. This is why they worked. Why they were funded. 1 secretive stroke of a 🇬🇧 pen and ‘poof’ - #ukricuts